🍽️ Gulin Spicy Chicken

Pepper-ma chicken in chili oil.

Gulin Spicy Chicken is a famous cold-dish of Gulin in Luzhou, Sichuan, a fine drinking snack of southern Sichuan. Local free-range chicken is boiled just until done, cooled and cut into pieces, then dressed with a numbing-spicy sauce of Sichuan pepper, dried chili, red chili oil, mashed garlic and sesame. The skin is crisp and the meat tender, firm but not dry; the sauce is glossy red, hitting first as chili heat then as a tingly Sichuan-pepper numbness dancing on the tongue, fragrant without being harsh. It is a common cold dish at Gulin summer night markets and group meals, best with baijiu or beer. People in southern Sichuan fine-tune the balance of numbness and heat; a great spicy chicken hinges on the chicken's own freshness in balance with the seasoning.